This body does not know self
This feeling does not know self
This inner does not know self
This outer does not know self
This mind, this body, this soul,
This, this, this and this
Do not know self
Yet this self, not known,
Knows.

The days are hot my friend
The tea cups tinkle and the strawberries are sweet
The coffee mugs pile up, and spoons
Are strewn extraordinarily about the place
The helichrysum hangs on the wall to dry
And a dead wasp lies clinging to the window frame
So near the formless yet holding its shape
Out of sheer stubbornness.

Insecta: Lepidoptera, Coleoptera, Diptera,
Mostly diptera, unstartled by the season's repetition,
Go their way. They do not penetrate the cycle,
Or if they do, they choose to forget.
Yet I do not forget, I await the dissolution
I await December, January, February
And the agony they bring
And the chasm they pose for all sentient life

My desires are temperate my friend
Excess of life startles me; I do not wish
To glimpse beneath the panoply
Nor linger at the hot-dog stall in the Strand
Or warm my hands over roasted chestnuts
Along the precincts of Shaftsbury Avenue.
That world is dead: Its figures
Its inhabitants, its conversations consumed;
Once touched by the flame of existence,
Flourished, then obediently awaited their dissolution
There are also seasons in the world of man.

November is the magic month
It conjures itself out of the dark
Carves a myth in the dank moonlight
And post Octumbral mists that scan sweetly
The Downs and the Stoke Newington evening air.
I await November, I am always awaiting her
For in November I feel the soft smoky tresses of her hair
I await the autumnal fires that flicker in her
November eyes, and I will always taste November
In my evening soul.

Last edited by Peter Blumsom on Fri Jul 16, 2010 9:09 pm; edited 2 times in total

Watching changes
Even the watcher is unreal
The fisherman recasts his line
And waits patiently
He cannot see the fish
The fish cannot see him
Silent meditation has no object
Has no subject

The door opens - the door closes
the light switches on then off
A mind without thought
Is neither here nor there

The jug that has both craft and beauty
It sits firmly on the shelf
It falls not to shatter on the floor
But adheres calmly to the wall

Where is there self among these trees?
Is there a still place in the woods,
That a great breeze does not come to disperse it?

The ship moves up to the jetty
It touches the side of the quay
It moves away and is gently brought back
Eventually great and bulky though it is,
Finely poised and superbly engineered
It rests in peace.

I am the watchtower
Whose guardian light
Peers mysteriously into night
Though seas may storm
Though winds may rage
Though all the elements engage
In mortal combat
None shall sway
My peerless vision
I am Day

There pink skinned lutenists with wings
Smiling sexless beings
Peering from beyond the roof of the world
In a pillar of unnatural cloud
Spin down from their web of delight
Upon our desert senses
All created within a patchwork of paint
An artificial perspective
A facsimile of some reality
That may have or may have never existed.

Verily, sayeth the prophet
What is Man?
What is the mind of man?
Wherein doth lie its root?
Doth it wear a suit
Or be it naked
Like all those pretty angels?
"Gad sah! 'pon me soul,
"I c'ud fancy 'em mesself
"If I c'ud be sure they were gals!"

'I've never been able to get into the renaissance.
'There's a certain lack
'Of sensuality
'About the figures.
'(Too much thinking, you know,
'It clogs the brain.)

Cimabue, Giotto, Masaccio,
Flowers that could not blossom
In the dank alchemy
Of Gothic naves;
Or the sleepy serenity
Of Byzantine arches
That yawned peace
Into a decaying world.

They were the post horns of Spring
Pre-timed apparitions of a gorgeous Summer
About to burgeon and crack the dust
That had gathered over men's eyelids.

When sun's beauteous dawn lights up the plain
And lovers from their loved ones furtive creep
When birds sing, in remembrance, their refrain
And young spring lambs from mothers' sides do leap
When such a morning's day smiles from the sky
At nature's trough I sip and have my fill
Then I to other things my mind apply
In efforts a rarer beauty to distil
But then my happy thoughts cry for release
Why labour, they say, for what is freely given?
Why does your brow in midst of joy so crease?
Why do you, in sweet beauty, death enliven?
At this my puzzled mind had no reply
But then a cloud removed the morning's eye.

Last edited by Peter Blumsom on Wed Feb 15, 2012 4:16 pm; edited 1 time in total

Alas, the fickle mind cannot remain
It doubts its place yet whither can it go?
Is it not rest to roam in such sweet pain?
If not, its thoughts would surely have it so.
For now, truly forgetful of its own
It sails upon a nowhere sea, an ark
Precise within, yet outward lost of home
Unpointed driftwood, rudderless and dark.
And never in its travels does it find
A journeys end, a terminus for thought
For its deep worth is of such a kind
That never with vague baubles could be bought
O Mind, there is one place, a place for you
And ever where you move, so it moves too.

Last edited by Peter Blumsom on Wed Feb 15, 2012 4:17 pm; edited 1 time in total

This is a poem written many years ago by my wife, Mali. She's asked me if I could put it on the poetry forum, so, as we are 'one', I've put it on my thread.

* * *Company* * *

Oh for that soul whose search, like mine,
Unites, so that life is a play, a mime,
Where speech of the tongue falls away, redundant,
For speech of the eyes and the hands have combined,
And bear witness to unison of souls, in their prime.

Where the light which derives from the depths of a pupil
Shines quietly abroad, and, through the windows of mine
Reaches gladly the heart, its gentle home, and rejoices.
For it sees of a sudden it has joined with the Self.
The Self that sees all and knows 'I am ONE'

Thence springs this hunger. For this nectar of Grace,
This moment of light, of reality, once sampled,
Awakens forever the desire for simplicity,
To be only enhanced by Illusion, by density.

Hence need and desire for that company,
Sweet company whose longings complement.
For together, all things binding are seen easily,
But in solitude, hence in weakness, are ill met.

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